The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man in Line at the DMV
by yorickjones
Summary: You're Dr. Bruce Banner, a man on the run from the monster inside, and you find yourself in the most irritating place on the planet the Department of Motor Vehicles.


**The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-In-Line-at-the-DMV**

I look at their faces and I pity them and I envy them and I know more than anything that I can't be one of them. Not any­more.

Still, I can wait in line with the best of them. It's a skill like any other. Like whistling or making macaroni and cheese or de­signing a bomb capable of laying waste to over forty miles and hundreds of years of human life and achievement. Compared to that, it's all pick-up sticks; all you need is patience and plenty of it.

Here I am in - what is this? Arizona? New Mexico? Some dry town with beige buildings and beige people and I haven't eaten in two or so days and I can wait in this line.

"_We can always use a good driver,"_ he says with flecks of sour cream or something from a greasy, foil-wrapped burrito stuck in his moustache. _"If you can work any of the heavy equip­ment - the CATs, the Deeres - that's a big plus. All we'll need is some ID and a look at your license."_

Aye, there's the rub.

Every town is safe for a few weeks, maybe months. Grab a job, whatever's paying for room and board and all the replace­ment shirts, pants and shoes. I probably spend more money on clothes in a year than all of these women put together.

With every job comes the same story - time for new IDs. As a matter of necessity, I've gotten quite good at finding the kind of people who can help a wandering stranger in such a predica­ment. And every town has them.

The woman behind the "Licenses Renewed/Transferred" counter is a great cow with her bifocals on a chain. She looks like she's worked here for twenty years, though it's most likely half that. Perhaps a study into the life expectancy of Public Service employees would reveal some interesting discrepancy between "workplace time" and "real time." Maybe a year working for the DMV is equal to two years natural time. Interesting, but unlikely. If that were the case, this myopic endomorph would be moving _much_ faster.

Inconceivable! Isn't this the same guy from ten minutes ago? The farmer or mechanic or whatever in the deep-stained overalls who still can't figure out which line he needs to be in to register his off-road monster truck? Did he_ actually _cut in line with eight people waiting behind him? Could they _possibly _be chatting about the local high school football team!

Whoa. Watch it. Seventy-three beats a minute. It's become reflex now; fingers to the wrist. Have to monitor. Keep the blood calm. Even. That's right. I've got all the time in the world and I _can_ wait in this line.

Could've been out of here by now. It's actually my second time through. Stupid, stupid reason. Had the form completed, spent half an hour in this same line, got up to the desk and started to hand over the paper to the self-same walking side of beef, smiled the best I could, and then realized I'd put the wrong name down. The wrong name for _this_ place. I'd written "Bob Bannister" - a pseudonym I haven't used since Cedar Rapids. Bad memories there. Started with a traffic jam then it's all a blur of screaming faces, property damage, and the National Guard.

Here I think I'm supposed to be "Dave Baxter." Thought it up on the bus. A quick look at my newly fabricated ID confirms the fact. _This_ is what I'm using my impressive mental capacity for: coming up with endless aliases and backgrounds. All so I can drive a gravel truck. Or mop floors. Or drop baskets of fries into boiling oil.

O how the mighty have fallen.

Still, it could be worse. I could have a general for a father-in-law.

That wasn't funny.

Best not to think about her. About those weekends off-base; that patented sweet look of boredom in her eyes and at the edges of her mouth as I rattled off whichever complex chain equa­tion just popped into my head. She would shut me up with a kiss. Then more.…

Whoops. Down, lover boy. Betty still does dangerous things to your heart rate.

"_I don't know what kind of a man you think you're pretend­ing to be,"_ he had growled, breath like a lifetime of wet cigars, _"but if you think for one moment you're the kind of man I'll see my daughter marry, you're not as smart as this man's Army thinks you are."_

Message received, you silver-maned bulldog. I guess you'll never have to worry about having gangly, milksop grandchildren, General, and that problem was solved with the push of one button--

"Next."

Huh? Oh. At la-- What does _this_ guy think he's doing? How many people get to cut in front of me today?

"Excuse me," I want to sound intimidating, but my voice al­ways comes out like a slightly peevish librarian's, "but _I_ was next actually."

Teenage punk finds me amusing, it seems. Jerks his head towards the rotund civil servant, "Maybe so, but the lady here said I could cut."

She's nodding, "He just had to get this stamped by the test master over there, so I told him to come right back when he did. It'll just be a moment, sir."

A moment she says. A _lot_ of things can happen in a moment, you fat-- "Is this the only window open, ma'am?"

Don't do it, lady, _don't you dare cock that eyebrow at me_.

"You see another one open, _sir_?"

There goes the vein in my throat. Throb, throb. No good. Calm. Take a deep breath and _wait_. You can do this. Fingers to the wrist. Maybe it'll help to hum along with the Muzak. I used to love this song, I think.

_Sugarpie honeybunch, you know that I love you. I can't help myself..._

Seventy-eight. Sloooow.

Why am I here? No reason. How long have I been in this line? I have no idea. That's right, I'm just killin' time. Looking around, observing these people. Detached and floating above. Studying their habits, peeking into their lives, relishing their mun­danity. That young Indian couple in the Passports line who can't keep their hands off each other. The elderly man taking the written exam over there trying to cheat off the paper of the teen-aged girl one desk over. The welfare mother smacking the sticky hands of her son away from the tassles on her beaded purse. These are the real people, these are the ones whose lives are en­dangered by my very thoughts, my feelings. They can't guess how jealous I am of them – their freedom. The freedom to worry about the future, to love, to hate. The freedom to _have a bad day_. People who are free to cast aside a billion meaningless moments of anger, fear, irritation and anxiety every single day without unleashing a mutagenic chain-reaction through their cells.

"Next."

Ah, here we go again.

"Welcome back, Mr. Patience-is-a-Virtue."

Just smile and hand the form over. Humbly concede, "Good one."

_Sugarpie honeybunch, I'm weaker than a man should be. I can't help myself-_

"Sorry about the wait," she's saying with a robotic lack of sin­cerity as she she scans the page, "but that's the kind of efficiency your tax dollars buy. Everything seems to be in order, Mr. Baxter. Hmm."

"Yes?"

"Under 'height' here you've written 5'8", while on your ID it says here 5'10". Are you shrinking?"

Anything _but,_ lady. Let it go, try to sound breezy and casual. "Why? Is there a penalty, some sort of a fine? Is it illegal to make a mistake around here?" Oh yeah, that worked.…

"You don't have to be rude about it, sir."

_Rude? _"Here, I'll fix it. Okay?"

That's right, just fish-eye me through those bifocals…

An apologetic smile that doesn't cost me anything, "I'm sorry. I've just been here too long already."

Turns back to her computer, entering my information. "Well, we all have other places we'd like to be, _sir_."

"Like Bermuda," from the 35-and-still-lives-with-his-mom type manning the camera.

"Amen to _that_, honey." She's presenting me that all-too familiar card with a stranger's name on it. "Okay, Mr. Baxter, here's your temporary license. Ronnie there will snap your picture, and then you'll be all set."

"Thanks."

Under her breath, "It's been a pleasure serving you."

Just get out of here, just be a random asshole she'll have for­gotten about by lunch. It's better –for all of them – if you just fade. If they never place you and if they never see you mad. It's a ridiculous responsibility to carry and yet here we are – here _I_ am. A walking bomb as dangerous as the monster I designed for the government – and in a much more direct fashion. Gotta be proud of your little boy now, Dad. Hands bigger than yours ever were, a footstep that shatters stone, this is the nightmare living in the mirror. Every minute of every day, waiting for the angry flash – the open door. The beast that's me, the thing they call- _shit!_

Wha--! I fell. Tripped over this – _dog leash!_ Who the hell brings their-- Great. They're laughing, the whole place. I'm the show for today. Get off the floor. And this yapping thing darting- take it easy, you slobbering furball – YOWTCH!

_BIT me!_

Ahhh, shit! That _hurt!_

Some woman yanking the mongrel away, shooting me a look like it's – the bitch behind the "Licences Renewed" window snicker­ing – gripping my arm – blood, not much, but – _shit_ – no – heart racing – _no – no –_

"_A strong man laughs at pain,"_ he'd said as he slid his belt back

on, _"but little girls like you, Brucie, all you can do is cry."_

Can do a lot more than that, Daddy – I can –

-- breathe, slow, _slooow_, please God – what's this guy saying?

"Are you okay, sir? Ready for your picture?"

I think I'm nodding but all I see is the haze – the emerald fog –

must, _must_ pull back from – brink – with breaths, deep breaths.…

The camera flashes.

Two weeks later it comes in the mail. A laminated souvenir of a (thankfully) close call.

My hands, once the very definition of delicate scholar's tools, now rough and scabbed, turn over the letter included in the official envelope. As tired as I am from the day's work onsite I still have to crack a smile as I read.

_Mr. Baxter:_

_Enclosed is your new driver's license. There may have been a defect within the camera or film that we have not been able to correct in our photolab as you can see. Whenever it may be convenient for you, we request that you return to your nearest office of the DMV to retake your picture._

As punchline, I gaze down at my twenty-third Class C driver's license from my fourteenth state and there he is, "Baxter, David" in all his glory, caught in disturbing portraiture some­where between Jekyll and Hyde. Skin an ashen gray, neck and jaw rippling and distended, and those eyes – my other eyes – smearing in a brilliant green blaze. My smile disapears as quickly as the flash of a G-Bomb in the desert sun.

I pity them and I envy them and I know more than anything that I can't be one of them. Not anymore.


End file.
